May 2005

Think the drug laws here are bad? Try taking a trip to Bali with a bit of weed. Obviously she was smuggling, but damn. Guess it could be worse, she could have gotten the fucking death sentence.
CNN.com – Fury at?Bali drugs verdict – May 27, 2005

I was getting ready to post anyway, when I ran across this post. I have three kids, so my wife and I have a pretty good plan that works out. We have to take turns. It works out pretty well anyway since my days off rotate, I am off during the week about 80% of the time anyway, so I do sick parent duty. This week, however, our two year old spent about 36 hours puking her guts up. What with me taking an extra day off for the funeral last week, we decided that she would stay at home. She has a certain amount of sick days that she is alloted anyway, which I unfortunately don’t. It is almost unheard of for a manager to call in sick. Company policy of course says that you don’t come to work when you are sick, but reality dictates it’s own terms.
The funeral for my friend Chris last week actually is what brings me to the point of this rambling shit, sort of. One of my waitresses called me last night, in tears, barely intelligible. I said ok, I would cover it, but was there anything that I could do for her? She said no, that her dog had died. Her FUCKING dog died YESTERDAY, so she can’t come to fucking work today. I didn’t day anything at all for a minute, finally I told her that she was just going to have to come to work. She babbled on and on, I don’t even know what the fuck she said. I finally just told her that I would cover the shift, and hung up.
She called back later, I did not answer, she was babbling on and just needed someone to talk to. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I went to my best friends funeral last week, missing one day of work, and was at work when they took him off life support. How do I tell a valued (in question) employee that I really don’t give a flying fuck about her fucking dog dying and maybe would like to run over a couple more of her fucking strays just to make her feel better.
I understand that people, me included, are very close to their pets, and a lot of times they feel as if the animal is part of the family. That’s ok, but the fact is, it was a fucking dog. I wasn’t a person and is not a fucking valid reason to not come to work. Perhaps if I come to your house and put a fucking bullet to your dog’s head a few minutes before you have to go to work, you might have a valid reason to call in, but not when it is an entire day before. They must have had to recover from having the fucking doggie wake.
Apparent’y she tried to call my cell phone earlier, didn’t leave a voice mail though. My boss calls me about 30 minutes later, and told me that the unnamed waitress would not be in tommorow because she has poison ivy, and with all of the crying and wiping of eyes, now she can’t see. bwah hahahahahahahahha. She also told me that I had hurt the waitresses feelings by not answering my cell phone when she called. Tough shit. I basically told my boss how I felt about it, and the fact that had I taken the call, I might have had to repeat it to the lady. I may be an asshole, but stupid I am not.

The Dirty Ashtray

   I got to the service about an hour early, so wandered around the grounds of St. Oliver’s Catholic Church just smoking like a damn chimney and checking things out. Had to leave early, it was about a hundred mile drive and I didn’t want to get stuck in the 8-9am traffic around the top end perimeter. As it is, it still took me around three hours, counting a stop at Wal-Mart for some new shoes. My boots that I have been wearing to work are still good for working around the house and whatnot, but they look like shit, so I needed a new pair anyway.
   I got to speak to Chris’ mom for a few minutes by herself, which was nice. I told her about how I had felt, and what I had said. She was a pretty big help with dealing with it, but I am still pretty fucked up over the whole thing. His brother Randy said some really nice things about him, you could tell he really felt uncomfortable, but got up and did it anyway. Haven’t seen him in a long time, I guess not since their sister died in ’87. That was a pretty fucked up incident in itself.
   Sat through the whole fucking Catholic service without having to go pee, which was a feat in itself. My wife’s family is catholic, and anyone that is knows exactly what I am talking about. Loooong services. Eleanor and Susan had put together a board with a whole bunch of pictures of Chris’ life that sat out in front of the chapel. We were in a bunch of them. Goddamn everyone looked so young.
   I did see several people that I have not seen in like 20 years or so. I went to the cemetery with them, that did not take quite as long as the service did, which was good because it was hot as a motherfucker. I stuck around to the last, after my friends LP and Steve (and wife) had left. The only ones left when it was time to fill the whole were myself, his brother Randy, and an old friend, Elizabeth. We all threw a handful of dirt in, and watched as the backhoe dumped the dirt in on top of his ashes.
   Eleanor was having a get-together at her place, basically a wake. I was going to go, but just couldn’t bring myself too. I will call her in a couple of days. I want to get her address so I can send her a letter along with a couple of pictures. Instead of going to her place, I stopped at Hooters and had a couple of beers in his honor on the way home. I think that that may have contributed to his death, but I am sure he wouldn’t mind.
   Chris was a true friend. I met him when I was 15, and he was about 17, and he became my defacto big brother that I had never had. We were roommates for a few months back then, kind of drifted apart, then hooked back up a few months later. Chris had a car, which I did not, so he drove us everywhere. We hung together, through thick and thin, for several years. It seems like longer than it actually was, because I was married by 22, and had already started to drift away from that crowd, as I had a job, and a pregnant wife. Chris was still there though. My son was born when Chris was overseas, and we had to use a proxy, but he became my son Christopher’s godfather.
   Maybe I can think of some of the stories and post them down over the next few days. I have to be somewhat careful, although the statute of limitations would have long ago run out on anything that I might have allegedly done, I do have a career to consider.
   The title of this post was actually brought to mind by one of the people there that have known me as long as Chris did. I think that maybe I will wait before posting that one. Just think lockups and mental hospitals. It’s actually quite funny now.

The funeral is this morning, and since it is halfway across the state I am getting ready to go here pretty soon. I haven’t seen some of these people in 15 or more years and am not sure that I want to see them all now.

One of the last times that I saw my friend Chris was at the funeral for another friend, a few years back. I remember saying something along the lines of him being a fat drunk. At least the fat part, maybe I just thought the drunk part. Either way, I felt that he was fucking up his life and that was the only way that I could say anything at that point. That was the very last thing I have said to him, and I sincerely regret it. I don’t make friends very easily, but I make them for life. I have a lot of acquaintances (sp?), but not very many friends.
The time before that, I had gone to Atlanta for a week to work (Stephanie and I were both in school at WGC at that time). Chris and I hooked up, and ended up going out to Buckhead. He drove. We went to some place called The Cavern. With me being the two-beer wonder that I am, I was pretty shitfaced. I know that he had to be as well. We ended up closing the damn place down. When we left, I know it had to be pretty late, because there was literally NO traffic on the road, which was a pretty fucking good thing. I somewhat remember Chris getting us a couple of blocks, before we saw blue lights. Chris knew he was going to jail, so told me to call his mom. I couldn’t even remember my fucking name at that point, so calling anyone was not an option. The officer gave me the choice of joining him (Chris), or vacating the car and getting the fuck out of Dodge. I chose the latter. I woke up at some point the next morning, asleep in the fucking bushes next to a restaurant on Peachtree Road. Still fucked up, hung over as hell. Caught Marta to my parents house, which is where I was staying at the time. I think that Chris must have gotten in touch with his mom, I DID NOT. Pretty shitty thing, but not the first asshole thing I have ever done.
Did I mention the fact that we were roommates off and on for several years. We were fucking tight. He is my son Christopher’s godfather. When we had him christened (what catholics call baptism) Chris was in Guam at the time, so we had someone else stand in as proxy, but the spirit was the same. Christopher is also named after him.
I Need to get in the shower and go to work as I am starting to cry, and think I will put that shit off for another time.

Chris Haynes died at 8am this morning. I had known him since 1982, he was like my brother. I don’t have a hell of a lot to post about this evening about it, so possibly this weekend.